– The Power of the Pope

Power to the Papal
BY BRENDAN MINITER

What does Fidel Castro know that many American liberals don't seem ever to have understood about Pope John Paul II? That's something worth asking as the dictator in Havana issued a personal statement of condolence and has allowed his people three days to mourn, three days to publicly act like a normal society amid a social structure otherwise built on fear.

Although he has much to account for, it is wrong to say Castro trembles--as a Polish dictator once visibly did--before this pope. But by allowing a papal visit to Cuba in 1998, Castro revealed that even he could not deny the power of the papacy. This is the legacy of John Paul--that moral capital is a lever that can pry up the edges of even the most repressive regimes and plant seeds of hope.

This was significant not only in facing down the twin evil ideologies of the 20th century, communism and Nazism. This is also essential to confronting the evil ideology of our time, Islamofascism.

It is important to stop here and consider the source of John Paul's power. It's been widely noted the past few days that Stalin once dismissively asked "how many divisions" the Vatican had. But the pope's divisions are composed of people of all nationalities who are willing to stand up and demand better for humanity. The pope has something more potent than any military force. His divisions are the very people tyrants continue to oppress and the millions in the free world who aren't willing to stand idly by.

By embracing the Dalai Lama, seeking to reconcile with Jews, and calling for a free Palestinian state, John Paul II was able to speak to all faiths when he called for respecting human rights. It was this call--linked to the policies of Ronald Reagan and many others--that gave hope and courage to millions of oppressed people.

It turns out that not only do all people prefer freedom to slavery, but also all governments rest to some degree on the consent of the governed. In repressive states this is the consent to stay locked in fear. But that fear lasts only as long as those oppressed believe that openly struggling against the repression is a futile effort. The North Korean regime stays in power because individuals make the calculation that one man speaking out will only succeed in drawing a long prison sentence--or worse--for himself. But if all those who despise the regime were willing to take to the streets, we'd learn that the ranks of dissenters are actually far larger than the those who benefit from the government's continued existence. If the chains of fear were broken, the regime would fall.

This was once dismissed as utopian. But it's what is happening in places like Ukraine, Lebanon and Kyrgyzstan today, and it is precisely what began to happen in Poland in 1981, reaching fruition throughout Eastern Europe in 1989. When a pathway of emigration was opened up to the West, those under Soviet control lost their fear. In short order crowds gathered around the Berlin Wall and pulled it down. Faced with such widespread protests in the streets, the Evil Empire soon found itself on the ash heap of history. Poland is free in part because Pope John Paul II stood up to the communists around the world and emboldened millions by saying with his words and his actions that there will be a moral accounting for what is done here on earth.

This triumph of morality and hope over fear and despotism has never been fully understood by the post-Vietnam American left. That's why we still hear theories that Mikhail Gorbachev was the one who brought the Soviet Union in for a soft landing--as if pressure from within and from the free world didn't force that landing upon him. This misunderstanding has also now found new life in opposition to George W. Bush's push for democracy in the Muslim world. It is true that John Paul despised war and wasn't willing to lend his moral capital to the effort to overthrow Saddam Hussein by force. It is also true, however, that the pope recognized the moral good in freedom over tyranny. He never tired of chiding world leaders of all stripes and of all faiths to respect the basic human rights of their people.

Human rights are no less important for Muslims as they are for anyone else. Until Iraq's elections, it was easy to assume that Iraqis didn't really want to be free. Looking across the Middle East, Western policy makers had for decades assumed that Arabs were not meant to be free. But that assumption, like the Iron Curtain, is now falling as people lose their fear to speak out. Partly this is due to America's military might in Iraq. But in Lebanon, Egypt and perhaps even the Palestinian areas, the chains of fear are starting to slip. People in the Middle East are starting to hope and have faith in their future.

Before the pope's death, even Castro came to understand that he had to acknowledge papal power, even while fearing the people power that was likely to unleash. It's unfortunate that John Paul II will not be here to see democracy take root in the Muslim world. But his message that governments must be held to a higher moral standard in respecting basic human dignity will be no less powerful as free societies begin to sprout in the Middle East.
 

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